Arminius

Arminius (18 BC-21 AD) was a Germanic tribal chief who, leading his Cherusci tribe and an alliance of other Germanic tribes, inflicted a devastating defeat on the Roman Empire at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD. Roman-educated, Arminius was well-educated on the strengths and weaknesses of the Roman Army, and he was an able leader of Germanic resistance to the Romans until the Romans withdrew in 16 AD.

Biography
Arminius was the son of the Germanic prince Segimerus, and he was raised in Rome as a hostage, being trained as a Roman military commander and receiving Roman citizenship. From 1 to 6 AD, he served in the Roman Army. During the reign of Emperor Augustus, much of Germmany east of the Rhine seemed in the process of absorption into the Roman Empire. Arminius, who had become a chieftain of the Cherusci, was prominent among the Germans collaborating with the Roman army as a trusted leader of local auxiliaries accompanying the legions. But like many Germanic people, Arminius was in truth hostile to the Roman intruders, and he plotted with other tribal leaders to rebel against the Roman presence.

In the summer of 9 AD, Roman legate Publius Quinctilius Varus led his forces, including Arminius' auxiliaries, on campaign in central Germany. A tribal enemy revealed Arminius' intended treachery, but Varus did not believe him. As the Romans, numbering some 10,000, marched toward their winter quarters through the mountainous Teutoburg Forest, Arminius deserted with his warriors. He returned, strengthened by allies, to ambush Varus among the trees and annihilate the legionaries. Five years later, a Roman army found gruesome evidence of this - heaps of bones and human skills nailed to trees.

The Romans reacted at once to this humiliation. Between 14 and 17 AD, Germanicus, nephew of Emperor Tiberius, pursued Arminius to seek revenge, defeating the Cherusci chief at Idistaviso on the Weser River. Nevertheless, the Romans abandoned efforts to expand beyond the Rhine. Arminius survived only to be later assassinated by tribal opposition.